I have used Android for past 3 years and the iPhone 5 (once it arrives) will be my first iOS phone. I really like how easy the iPad is to use so I'm sure I'll like it. My Android device definitely is more customizable though.

Problem with android is fragmentation. That is indisputable. It is difficult for amateur developers and even companies to develop for android. Imagine how many devices with android oS there are, imagine the idea of having to test your app on every android device to see if it works, now imagine only the top 3 phones are chosen to develop for because it is infeasible to test the app on every phone. You run into issues where app works for phone x but not for phone y. The app will probably crash for phone z. Now imagine that phone X, Y, and Z all run on different hardware. Good luck debugging.

on iOS you have one hardware software platform to develop for similar to developing apps for windows. It's a lot more intuitive so that is why the apps for iOS are a lot better than android. Also runs faster because it's native coding. At least most apps are native. Some companies try to develop in HTML 5 and that is just a bad idea.

edit:
Also to note on android a lot of companies take shortcuts and develop using XML. XML is interpreted like HTML is. Android is a virtual machine that runs on top of JIT. Just in time compilation. In layman terms all you need to know is that it is slower. SO you have XML code that is interpreted on top of a virtual machine that uses JIT. It's double interpreted and that is why you need such high powered hardware to run android efficiently. In android 4.1 jelly bean they sped up the OS by over-clocking the processor in order to interpret all that garbage so it doesn't appear sluggish. Completely inefficient operating system that will eventually choke itself to death.

I have used Android for past 3 years and the iPhone 5 (once it arrives) will be my first iOS phone. I really like how easy the iPad is to use so I'm sure I'll like it. My Android device definitely is more customizable though.

It has the best screen quality on the market, best CPU and GPU, the smoothest, most performance-efficient, most stable OS on the market. It has a premium feel and it's super compact and light yet has a very good battery life.

It has more and better apps than the competition. The OS is updated for 4 years, is easy to use, virus-free and has good design (both easthetically and functionally). It's simple and trouble-free enough to let you focus on the tasks you want to do without messing around too much.

That's more personnal but I think screen size is ideal (a phone should be easy to use one-handed IMO) and I like that it integrates seamlessly with my other Apple products/services (OS X, iTunes, iPad, iCoud, iTunes Match, iPhoto).

I may be interested in Android phones if there was a flagship phone that wasn't monstrously big yet had top of the line performance with a good battery life and a good screen, and ideally a Nexus so that it stays updated and has no crappy skin. Unfortunately "small" (less than 4.5") Androids are often slow budget phones and even the big powerful models have bad PenTile OLED screens, an undesired skin and a cheap plastic construction.

The postive keyword I hear to describe Android is often "customizable" but honestly I don't care about those things. Most of my devices still have their original backgrounds and I haven't ever changed default app icons placement, ringtones or the few things I can customize in iOS. When stuff works well I don't play with it.

It has the best screen quality on the market, best CPU and GPUIt doesn't have the best CPU and GPU in the market. There are different benchmarks out there that show different results. In one benchmark Galaxy S3 got 1800 with geekbench, and the others got 1600-1700, so it's quite the same.

, the smoothest, most performance-efficient, most stable OS on the market.No, it's not. Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean) works as good as iOS.

It has a premium feel and it's super compact and light yet has a very good battery life.

Samsung's S3 battery is better. It has super compact and light feel because you have tiny screen. Yes, Samsung has plastic cover on the back, but you can change your battery if you need too. In iPhone you can't.

It has more and better apps than the competition.The gaps are minimal.
Current number of Android apps in the market: 534,936
Current number of iOS apps in the market: ~700,000

23% difference. All major apps are available on both platforms.

The OS is updated for 4 years, is easy to use, virus-free and has good design (both easthetically and functionally).

Nothing in this world is virus free. OSX and iOS can get viruses and are actually very vulnerable as Kaspersky noted couple of weeks ago. I didn't hear about any Android viruses so far.

It's simple and trouble-free enough to let you focus on the tasks you want to do without messing around too much.

Same as Android, it's a user preference. You can't say something is simple, it's subjective.

That's more personnal but I think screen size is ideal (a phone should be easy to use one-handed IMO) and I like that it integrates seamlessly with my other Apple products/services (OS X, iTunes, iPad, iCoud, iTunes Match, iPhoto).

After a week with a 4.5+ inch screen, you would never want to comeback to 4 inch and below screens. It would even look funny to you.

I may be interested in Android phones if there was a flagship phone that wasn't monstrously big yet had top of the line performance with a good battery life and a good screen, and ideally a Nexus so that it stays updated and has no crappy skin. Unfortunately "small" (less than 4.5") Androids are often slow budget phones and even the big powerful models have bad PenTile OLED screens, an undesired skin and a cheap plastic construction.

The postive keyword I hear to describe Android is often "customizable" but honestly I don't care about those things. Most of my devices still have their original backgrounds and I haven't ever changed default app icons placement, ringtones or the few things I can customize in iOS. When stuff works well I don't play with it.

Click to expand...

At the end of the day, Android or iOS is user preference. You can't say one is better than the other, it's like comparing BMW to Mercedes.

It isn't. I've used both and they're honestly just different. For web browsing, I prefer Android by leaps and bounds. Text resizing and screen size play a huge factor in that. If I'm playing a game, I like that screen real estate as well. I can't type well on any touch screen due to large hands, so anything extra helps. Notifications and the LED indicator are superior and make life a lot easier.

On the other hand, build quality on the iPhone is better, and the screen is second to none. Apps are released quicker/some are exclusive to the iPhone. If you always want the latest operating system, then the iPhone won't steer you wrong. Copy and paste is less frustrating. There is slightly (almost imperceptibly) less lag on an iPhone.

In the end, you should really just try both for yourself. I'd wager you'd be happy with either one.

It has the best screen quality on the market, best CPU and GPU, the smoothest, most performance-efficient, most stable OS on the market. It has a premium feel and it's super compact and light yet has a very good battery life.

It has more and better apps than the competition. The OS is updated for 4 years, is easy to use, virus-free and has good design (both easthetically and functionally). It's simple and trouble-free enough to let you focus on the tasks you want to do without messing around too much.

That's more personnal but I think screen size is ideal (a phone should be easy to use one-handed IMO) and I like that it integrates seamlessly with my other Apple products/services (OS X, iTunes, iPad, iCoud, iTunes Match, iPhoto).

I may be interested in Android phones if there was a flagship phone that wasn't monstrously big yet had top of the line performance with a good battery life and a good screen, and ideally a Nexus so that it stays updated and has no crappy skin. Unfortunately "small" (less than 4.5") Androids are often slow budget phones and even the big powerful models have bad PenTile OLED screens, an undesired skin and a cheap plastic construction.

The postive keyword I hear to describe Android is often "customizable" but honestly I don't care about those things. Most of my devices still have their original backgrounds and I haven't ever changed default app icons placement, ringtones or the few things I can customize in iOS. When stuff works well I don't play with it.

2. While iPhone has a 1.3 Ghz dual-core processor with triple-core GPU, its still not A15 (neither are current Android devices) but not quad-core (which tons of Android, Windows, etc. devices are)

3. For battery life, while the iPhone 5 has good battery life, the iPhone 4 still has the best followed by the iPhone 5 and then iPhone 4S. Perphaps its because of the LTE, but I iPhone 5 and the SIII both have about the same battery life.

4. Android OS is also virus free. Google never adds viruses into their OS...which would just be dumb. If your talking about the Android market, yes there's malaware but if your not stupid and download some random app your safe. Your not going to get a virus for downloading Angry Birds or Twitter on Google Play. Plus the App Store isn't malaware free either...I think several apps that had malaware acciendently got approved.

5. Honestly I hate when people say that something is ideal. Pretty sure when the iPhone was just 3.5 inch you were like "this size is ideal." Apple comes along and changes it to 4 inches and your now "this is ideal." Goes with any other phone, OS, manufacturer, etc. Its annoying.

6. If you ever actually used a Galaxy Nexus, its actually extremely fast and smooth just like iOS thanks to Project Butter. It also has just as good of battery as the iPhone.

7. As far as your customizationphobia, I guess thats normal if you own Apple devices. However I prefer to make my iPhone, productive so I arrange stuff based on my own needs. Just feel that sticking with everything normal is basically like dictatorship.

It isn't better, and it isn't worse. Of course its subjective on the devices you compare them too (obviously a free Android phone is going to be a different experience than the Samsung GSIII), but as operating systems they're both pretty equal, and each surpass the other in different ways.

1. Because Apple has patented many interface shortcuts Android phones do not implement most of the easy of use features that iPhones do. iPhones are so intuitive to go kids can use them BEFORE they learn to speak. This is important because it just makes doing everything easier and smoother and it takes less concentration. When I'm on the go, distracted or out at night I don't have to think about using the iPhone. I've tried both Android and the iPhone and this is a huge difference.

2. Absurd fragmentation. There are less than a dozen i-devices. There are tens of thousands of android devices all with different specs. This creates several sub issues:

a. Lack of optimization. The iPhone can in effect do twice as much with the same hardware as an Android phone because programs are optimized for a few devices, where with Android they are not. This means you can really push the hardware on an iPhone and get amazing tripple A games.

b. Compatabiliy. Everything works. This is a big deal, I do not need to be wasting time using things that do not work with 9342 devices and only work with 2341 devices.

c. Easy to program for. Developers push programs for the iPhone out much faster. They have to test things less and there are fewer variables. This means iPhones get the best apps first.

3. Usability and ergonomics. Apple very carefully thought out the usability and egronomics of the phone. Never have I asked myself "why the ******* would they put a screen on a phone that is just a tiny bit too short to reach with one hand", "why the ******* do they have 4 buttons which I can't reach while using the phone with one hand normally" even the volume, lock connector etc is well thought out "why the ******* would you not use a reversible dock connector?"

4. Quality, iPhones are built like $10,000 Breitling watches. All other phones within financial reach of normal consumers are made of absurdly cheap Toys 'R' Us materials that are mind bogglingly lame. You're buying a $600+ device, and they can't put $30 of nice material on the outside? This is just insulting.

5. Service, Apple has some of the best service in the world, and that service is LOCAL, you can walk into any Apple store and get it, no going online. I've had iPhones and their accessories replaced for the most minor things. Apple welcomes nitpickers. HTC basically told me "tough" when they sent me a physically deffective phone and made me sell it on eBay for another one while it was under warranty. It is also almost impossible to reach these Android manufacturers, Apple is always there for you.

6. iPhones are seamless, they automatically sync with my Mac without having to do anything, which is immensly useful, and your whole phone with all it's settings is constanty backed up to the cloud. You can restore an iPhone at the slightest whim. Which makes upgrading and swapping warranty replacements super easy.

3. Cool apps like emulators. You can just jailbreak the iPhone and get those, and they work much better. Don't even try to tell me that it's finecky to jailbreak your iPhone. With Android it's finecky to instal ANY app, and is much worse overall.

So in conclusion there are many reasons why the iPhone is better and Android is not.

I'll share with you my experiences, coming from the Android platform for years, and this is my FIRST iOS / iPhone ever.

I believe it's the efficiency of the iOS that outdoes the Android.

Why? I had a Rezound from VZW with extended battery. I have it rooted, S-Off and on the most battery conserving ROM.

Exchange push from work, Hotmail Push, GMail Push, social network updates every 15 minutes, bluetooth music streaming during LA traffic commute, text, browse, at least half hour video viewing (YouTube/Sling) at the gym and 10-15 minutes of talk on a daily basis, even the extended battery on the Rezound would be pretty much dead by the time I go to bed.

On the iPhone, SAME usage, background, foreground, network connection (50/50 LTE&Wifi daily) and whatever you have, by the time I go to bed it'll have at least a third of juice left.

This pretty much applies to the OS X as well. Ever wonder why a copy of Windows make your MacBook / Pro runs hot and drains battery fast? While on OS X it can last at least 6 hours?

It doesn't have the best CPU and GPU in the market. There are different benchmarks out there that show different results. In one benchmark Galaxy S3 got 1800 with geekbench, and the others got 1600-1700, so it's quite the same.

Click to expand...

Those benchmarks either use an overclocked CPU or unofficial (less stable) ROM. Most people will have a stock (stable build) OS and stock clock speed.

Quote

No, it's not. Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean) works as good as iOS.

Click to expand...

Maybe it's smooth enough for you but you can't deny that iOS is more power efficient. An iPhone 4S has terrible specs on paper compared to a GS3 yet most reviews I've seen say it's smoother than the GS3 even with JB. The iPhone 5 is even smoother in comparison, again with what appears as worse specs on paper. I have a iPhone 5 and compared with my friend's GS3 with JB (CM10) and the difference in smoothness is quite big, even he agreed.

Quote

Samsung's S3 battery is better. It has super compact and light feel because you have tiny screen.

Click to expand...

It has a higher capacity on paper but doesn't last as long in real word usage. See the Anandtech GS3 review, even the iPhone 4S beats it.

The iPhone is light because it's thin and made out of aluminum, not just because it has a screen size that's appropriate for a human hand. Samsung makes big phones because it's easy to crank up specs like number of cores/clock speed when you have a huge battery to compensate, which itself needs a big casing. Try to find a powerful Android phone the size of an iPhone 5. That's a real challenge to design.

Quote

The gaps are minimal.
Current number of Android apps in the market: 534,936
Current number of iOS apps in the market: ~700,000

23% difference. All major apps are available on both platforms.

Click to expand...

A lot of AA games are iOS only. What's the point of having big specs if you have much less console-quality games? A lot of Android apps are also pretty amateur and wouldn't have been approved in the App Store.

Quote

Nothing in this world is virus free. OSX and iOS can get viruses and are actually very vulnerable as Kaspersky noted couple of weeks ago. I didn't hear about any Android viruses so far.

Click to expand...

Source? AFAIK there has never been virus on either iOS or OS X.

Quote

Same as Android, it's a user preference. You can't say something is simple, it's subjective.

Click to expand...

You might like one or another more in the long run, but iOS' learning curve is still much lower than Android's. You can judge by how tech-illiterate people like very young kids and old people adapt to it.

Quote

After a week with a 4.5+ inch screen, you would never want to comeback to 4 inch and below screens. It would even look funny to you.

Click to expand...

I don't know, I just moved up to 4.0" and I'm not even sure if I like it better yet. I find the back button a little hard to hit at times. Maybe slightly smaller (3.8") would be ideal for me, but that's just me, some have larger hands. I however haven't seen people with hands big enough to hit all portions of a 4.8" screen with a single hand without moving its palm on the back of the phone.

Sure a large screen looks good when viewing content but for what I use my phone for it would be putting form over function and I think easy one-handed operation is more important.

2. While iPhone has a 1.3 Ghz dual-core processor with triple-core GPU, its still not A15 (neither are current Android devices) but not quad-core (which tons of Android, Windows, etc. devices are)

3. For battery life, while the iPhone 5 has good battery life, the iPhone 4 still has the best followed by the iPhone 5 and then iPhone 4S. Perphaps its because of the LTE, but I iPhone 5 and the SIII both have about the same battery life.

4. Android OS is also virus free. Google never adds viruses into their OS...which would just be dumb. If your talking about the Android market, yes there's malaware but if your not stupid and download some random app your safe. Your not going to get a virus for downloading Angry Birds or Twitter on Google Play. Plus the App Store isn't malaware free either...I think several apps that had malaware acciendently got approved.

5. Honestly I hate when people say that something is ideal. Pretty sure when the iPhone was just 3.5 inch you were like "this size is ideal." Apple comes along and changes it to 4 inches and your now "this is ideal." Goes with any other phone, OS, manufacturer, etc. Its annoying.

6. If you ever actually used a Galaxy Nexus, its actually extremely fast and smooth just like iOS thanks to Project Butter. It also has just as good of battery as the iPhone.

7. As far as your customizationphobia, I guess thats normal if you own Apple devices. However I prefer to make my iPhone, productive so I arrange stuff based on my own needs. Just feel that sticking with everything normal is basically like dictatorship.

Click to expand...

The link you posted about the screen doesn't state much specs and doesn't consider real-world results either. Take a look and Anandtech's or DisplayMate comparisons. Those are real display specialists and come to totally different conclusions. iSuppli usually estimate costs of components, they're not reviewers. They didn't talk about most important specs and focused mainly on physical dimensions for some reason. The GS3 has a blue tint, PenTile matrix, over vibrant color and much lower sRGB color accuracy.

My personal ideal screen size would be around 3.8", but I do have small hands. I did state that was personal.

A Galaxy Nexus, even with JB, is much less fluid than an iPhone 4S, let alone a 5. It also has outdated specs and a terrible camera. I heard from owners it has a very bad battery life and it was its weakest point, along with the camera. It however is well priced I must admit. Given that's it's fairly old tech it's more of a mid-range phone right now and should more be compared with the iPhone 4/4S (which are also still for sale at a lower price) IMO.

Those benchmarks either use an overclocked CPU or unofficial (less stable) ROM. Most people will have a stock (stable build) OS and stock clock speed.

Maybe it's smooth enough for you but you can't deny that iOS is more power efficient. An iPhone 4S has terrible specs on paper compared to a GS3 yet most reviews I've seen say it's smoother than the GS3 even with JB. The iPhone 5 is even smoother in comparison, again with what appears as worse specs on paper. I have a iPhone 5 and compared with my friend's GS3 with JB (CM10) and the difference in smoothness is quite big, even he agreed.

It has a higher capacity on paper but doesn't last as long in real word usage. See the Anandtech GS3 review, even the iPhone 4S beats it.

The iPhone is light because it's thin and made out of aluminum, not just because it has a screen size that's appropriate for a human hand. Samsung makes big phones because it's easy to crank up specs like number of cores/clock speed when you have a huge battery to compensate, which itself needs a big casing. Try to find a powerful Android phone the size of an iPhone 5. That's a real challenge to design.

A lot of AA games are iOS only. What's the point of having big specs if you have much less console-quality games? A lot of Android apps are also pretty amateur and wouldn't have been approved in the App Store.

Source? AFAIK there has never been virus on either iOS or OS X.

You might like one or another more in the long run, but iOS' learning curve is still much lower than Android's. You can judge by how tech-illiterate people like very young kids and old people adapt to it.

I don't know, I just moved up to 4.0" and I'm not even sure if I like it better yet. I find the back button a little hard to hit at times. Maybe slightly smaller (3.8") would be ideal for me, but that's just me, some have larger hands. I however haven't seen people with hands big enough to hit all portions of a 4.8" screen with a single hand without moving its palm on the back of the phone.

Sure a large screen looks good when viewing content but for what I use my phone for it would be putting form over function and I think easy one-handed operation is more important.

Funny I hear people saying OS X and Macs get viruses but in the 15 years of owning a Mac, I've never encountered a single virus, nor any spyware/malware for that matter. Yes I'm aware it exists, but to me personally I never had an issue.

To me what sets the iPhone far apart from any Android device is Apple's ecosystem.

im coming from a samsung epic 4g on sprint, and this is why i chose iphone 5:

1)its a guarantee based on apple's history i will get at least 2 full years worth of software updates, where as my epic 4g was last upgraded 8 months ago to gingerbread. sprint has said they will not be releasing an update for ICS, so im basically forced to get a new phone if i want an updated OS with android.

2)the quality of the hardware and detail is much better this this cheap tacky plastic samsung uses in thier phones.

3)got tired of having a laggy ass OS

4)my phone kept doing the weirdest things like alarm going of in the middle of the day, screen not turning when opening up slider, id get a phone call but my phone wouldnt ring or vibrate. i attribute this to the OS.

5)love the fact that i can take a pic on my iphone and have icloud push it to my devices.

6)higher resell value

7)better quality apps

8)everything is just easier to do in the OS, where as with android i have to customize it for at least a couple of hours out of the box.

MacRumors attracts a broad audience
of both consumers and professionals interested in
the latest technologies and products. We also boast an active community focused on
purchasing decisions and technical aspects of the iPhone, iPod, iPad, and Mac platforms.